Kenyan journalist threatened for his reporting

New York, December 9,
2011--The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned about the safety of
Kenyan reporter Robert Wanyonyi who has been repeatedly threatened after
covering a melee between police and local villagers that left as many as seven
people dead.

On December 5,
Wanyonyi, a reporter in the city of Bungoma West for The Standard and for the Nairobi-based private broadcaster Kenya Television Network (KTN), was called
to Sirisia village in western Kenya to cover a violent fracas. Villagers had
killed two people who had broken in to the Namang'ofulo Coffee Factory to steal
coffee, according to news reports. That set off a violent confrontation between
villagers and local authorities who started firing at the crowd and killed four
people, news reports said.
Police even shot at Wanyonyi's car, the journalist said. He managed to avoid
the attack and wrote two stories that night detailing how the robbery took
place, he said. In the December 5 KTN broadcast, local residents claimed that
District Commissioner Paul Merinyang was behind the attempted theft,news
reports said.

On December 8, after
Wanyoni wrote a follow-up story on the incident, an unidentified caller phoned him
and told him to stop reporting on the district commissioner or "We will kill
you and see whether KTN will bury you," the journalist said. The same day, Wanyoni
was followed by two police officers when he returned to Sirisia village to
conduct follow-up interviews, according tomember of Parliament Musikari
Kombo, who was traveling with the journalist. Wanyoni said he was able to
record the license plate of the police car.

On December 9,
another anonymous caller told Wanyoni that he was "lucky" he had other
people in his vehicle the previous day since their presence saved his life. The journalist said his email had been hacked
and that he was now in hiding because of the threats.

"It is outrageous
that Robert Wanyoni, who was simply doing his job, was subjected to
intimidation and harassment by police," said CPJ East Africa Consultant Tom
Rhodes. "CPJ calls on authorities to make a credible investigation into these
threats and allow Wanyonyi to carry out his work without harassment."

In November,
investigative KTN editor Mohammed
Ali received death threatsafter he aired a series of stories on
officials' complicity in the drug trade, along Kenya's
coastline, according to
local reports.